What is Chemical Engineering?

Chemical engineering is the study of how materials transform, flow, and react, and how to control these processes. These materials could be a flowing liquid, settling dust, swelling gels, a charging battery, or the combination of these in one system. For example, the system could be a tank in the desert with unknown reactants inside due to neglect. A chemical engineer would likely be able to analyze its contents, predict future reactions or phase changes, and control the system without its becoming unstable. What if there is a solar-powered stirrer inside, and the fluid shear is weathering away the tank walls? What if there are bacteria within, and they are contaminating the contents? What if the bacterial growth is somehow causing a crystallization phase change making the solar-powered stirrer unstable, requiring a model-predictive control mechanism to maintain stability?

A depiction of the various subject areas involved in chemical engineering.

As you can see from above, chemical engineering involves a lot of different subject areas, and the chemical engineer should be relatively proficient in all these areas. The image above shows a handful of potential subjects needed in chemical engineering. And remember, a chemical engineer is not a chemist. The chemical engineer should know both chemistry and physics, use mathematics with both of them, and unify all three to solve problems (and to maximize profit if you’re in industry)!